A new technique with magnets allows you to make surgery less aggressive on the child population and reduce, therefore, the postoperative pain
A new technique with magnets allows you to make surgery less aggressive on the child population and reduce, therefore, the post-operative pain. For interventions in digestive, thoracic, urologic… The service of Pediatric Surgery of the Hospital Vall d’hebron of Barcelona is the first in Spain to include this method to work in their operating rooms.
The new system facilitates the movement of the viscera in a minimally invasive and less aggressive than the traditional formula and can be used in a large number of surgeries without leaving a visible scar. For example, to extract the gallbladder through the umbilicus without the need for further incisions.
To date, magnets have been used in interventions in digestive, thoracic, urological, oncological, and for cholecystectomy (gallbladder removal). “Always with success and no surgical complications”, points out Carles Ginès, Section chief of Gastrointestinal Surgery and Thoracic Pediatric hospital in barcelona.
it Consists in the introduction into the interior of the body of a few small magnets with clamps that allow you to grab and move the viscera with the help of a magnet outside fixed to the operating table, which can move in any direction.
through a surgical port of 10 mm is introduced, the instrumental. In this way, they are needed less incisions and, to get better exposure of the tissues that are going to intervene, you need less surgical tools. “When you’re exposed tissues better, such as allow you to make the magnets, the ejecusión of the surgery is more precise and, therefore, safer for the patient,” says Gines.
The traction of the viscera is a usual maneuver in any type of surgery. Do this without magnets, of traditional form, involves the use of more surgical instruments. The fact that they can reduce the number of incisions and tools has a great advantage, and is that it minimizes the postoperative pain, as explained by the specialists, who will not let the opportunity pass to thank for the idea of its creator, dr. Guillermo Dominguez, of the Argentinean Foundation of Buenos Aires.
For the surgical team also represents a help, because the magnet does not need a second or third person to handle, improving ergonomics (since the magnet can be moved in any direction from the outside) and the space surgical is more free instruments.
In the present, and given the poor results, the team of Vall d’hebron is working to reduce even further the dimensions of the magnets (now, they are 10 mm) and in the adaptation of other instruments. The goal is to achieve less invasive surgeries, and get a better result from the aesthetic point of view. In the words of Ginés, “we are ready to develop this technique to the maximum. The possibilities with this technology are immense”. In this sense, he says, “I am convinced that in a few years, the introduction of magnets within the body is a surgical practice standard at all hospitals of the State.”
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